What Ever Happened TO Baby Jane?
Composite Score: 85.93
Starring: Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Victor Buono, Wesley Addy, Marjorie Bennett, Anna Lee, Maidie Norman, and Bert Freed
Director: Robert Aldrich
Writer: Lukas Heller
Genres: Drama, Horror, Thriller
MPAA Rating: Passed
Box Office: $9.00 million worldwide
Why should you Watch This Film?
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? is the film adaptation of Henry Farrell’s novel of the same name about an aging child star who harasses her paralyzed formerly successful sister in their large mansion in Hollywood. The film stars Bette Davis and Joan Crawford as the Hudson sisters – “Baby” Jane and Blanche, respectively. They are joined by Victor Buono as Edwin Flagg the struggling pianist hired by Jane to supposedly restart her career, Marjorie Bennett as Flagg’s mother Dehlia, Anna Lee as their neighbor Mrs. Bates, and Maidie Norman as their housekeeper and Blanche’s caretaker Elvira Stitt. The psychological horror/thriller received positive reviews for its performances and Aldrich’s decisions that helped cement the film within the horror genre. It also received five Oscar nominations, including Best Lead Actress for Davis, Best Supporting Actor for Buono, and a win for Best Black-and-White Costume Design.
Why shouldn’t you Watch This Film?
I feel like this film could have been trimmed by about ten minutes or so and really hit a note of perfection. It’s shot like a horror film with plenty of eerie and frantic shots to remind you of the genre that it’s trying to inhabit, but the sequences with Edwin and his mother feel a bit too drawn out and take you too much out of the action to make the film feel truly streamlined. The best horror films do little to no explaining of the backstory or personal life of whatever person eventually discovers the terror that’s been going on, which makes those extra scenes, however well-acted they may be, feel out of place within the pacing and format of the rest of the film. I should also point out here that What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? feels like what you’d get if you mashed up Sunset Boulevard and Misery, which makes it feel derivative of the first and overshadowed a bit by the second, but it still saves itself as an original film in the end (even if the “twist” isn’t that surprising).
So wait, why should you Watch This Film?
The brilliance of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? lies in its acting, which has some of the best horror performances of all time contained in it. Joan Crawford’s part gets a bit overshadowed by Bette Davis, both in the film and in most discussion around the film, but it’s a quiet, physically demanding, and emotive performance that keeps you invested in the characters and makes the film work. Without a decent rooting interest, it would be easy to write this film off, and she saves it from that in her role as Blanche. Victor Buono earned an Oscar nomination for his brief supporting role as Edwin, and for a while, I wasn’t totally sure why, but then he gets his big moments in the film’s final act, holding his own with both Marjorie Bennett as his mother and with Bette Davis as his employer. It’s probably the most nuanced performance of his entire career, and in hindsight, it’s disappointing that we didn’t get more stuff like this from the prolific character actor. Obviously, though, it’s Bette Davis who runs the show in this film. Yes, the other performances are admirable, but next to the terrifyingly tragic performance Davis gives as the washed up, aging former child star, very few performances hold up. It’s a role that could easily have strayed into the campy or comic, skewing the entire film into the territory of farce, but she instead keeps it chilling and pitiable, portraying the effects of years of emotional trauma with a deep level of realness and mania, making the character both lovable and hateful at the same time.
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? could have easily fallen by the wayside as so many psychological horror films have throughout the history of cinema, but instead, the three actors at its heart gave some of the best horror performances of all time and elevated the film to a place of greatness. It certainly struggles at times to maintain its narrative momentum, but the work done by the actors and filmmakers here makes it a film worth considering. At the moment, the film is available to rent on most streaming services if you’d like to see what it’s all about.
